Archive for the ‘Drug War’ Category

35 out of 60 people have been indicted by a Federal grand jury so far ( names listed below). See if you can see a pattern in their names ! Thanks to Mary Frances Forrester for sharing this article. Nancy

President Trump unleashed ICE once again this week, this time deploying its Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) unit, along with the DEA to arrest dozens of convenience store owners across 4 states.

Over 60 people were arrested, and already 35 of them have been indicted by a Federal grand jury, with federal conspiracy charges for money laundering, distributing controlled substances and trafficking contraband cigarettes.

(T)he suspects conspired for more than 2 years to buy contraband cigarettes in St. Louis, a low tax market, while transporting and distributing them in Chicago, Illinois, and New Jersey, which are high tax markets. The store owners are accused of using several convenience stores that they operated to create the appearance of legal cigarette purchases.

Illegal profits form the contraband cigarette sales were laundered through accounts associated with the stores, and used to manufacture and distribute illegal controlled substances.

A synthetic drug, K-2, was sold every day from a handful of the convenience stores. Authorities said the store owners manufactured synthetic drugs themselves by importing chemicals from China.

“The collaboration with our federal and local law enforcement partners is the key to breaking criminal enterprises in this area,” said Special Agent in Charge James M. Gibbons of HSI Chicago.

“Synthetic drugs that are sold as substitutes for cocaine and methamphetamine, are neither legal nor safe,” said James P. Shroba, Special Agent in Charge of the DEA St. Louis Division. “These substances were never intended for human consumption and only serve to satisfy the avarice of the seller.”

If convicted, the defendants face a maximum of five to 20 years in prison and the a $1 million dollar fine.

But here’s what the Associated “Press” didn’t think you needed to know…the names of those indicted.

Nearly 30% of illegal immigrant children at border have ties to MS-13 or other gangs

Mr. Albence singled out the Chicago area as one of the most prominent sanctuaries. “Chicago is a large one. We haven’t been able to get into the Cook County Jail for a long time,” he said……….“We know who they are, we know they’re gang members, we know they’re criminals. But if the city, the county, doesn’t allow us to get into that jail then they’re released back into the community,” he said.

Nearly 30 percent of the illegal immigrant children the U.S. is currently holding in its secure dormitories have ties to criminal gangs, the government revealed Wednesday, suggesting the Obama-era surge of Central Americans has fed the country’s growing problem with MS-13 and other gangs.

Federal officials refused even to guess at the true scope of the problem, telling the Senate Judiciary Committee that they can give only small snapshots of what they see. But they said the devastation on communities across the country is clear: killings and chaos, particularly among other immigrants — both legal and illegal.

The Border Patrol identified 160 teens who were known or suspected gang members when they first showed up at the border, but whom the Obama administration said it had to admit under U.S. law.

Santa Claus is commonly imagined as a jolly, benevolent figure who delivers presents to deserving children all over the world. However, another version of Santa Claus exists in the organized crime underworld of Belgium where a Moroccan namedKhalid Zerkaniis commonly known as “Papa Noel.” Before his arrest, Zerkani would routinely handout money and presents to at-risk youth in the Molenbeek neighborhood of Brussels, luring them into his organization. Unlike ordinary organized crime groups that engage in illegal activities for personal enrichment, Zerkani’s group used its criminal proceeds tofinance trips of recruitsfrom Europe to join the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). One notorious recruit of Zerkani’s wasAbdelhamid Abaaoud— the ringleader of the Paris terrorist attacks.

The link between crime, radicalism, and ISIL has only recently come into greater focus. Oil smuggling, extortion, and sex trafficking in ISIL-controlled territory are well-known, yet other crimes like drug production, trafficking, and consumption are not. It is important to better understand drug use and the drugs trade because both are helping ISIL commit atrocities and wage its campaign of terror. Viewing ISIL and other jihadist groups as mere collections of drug-crazed fanatics, however, would be a caricature. Organizations like ISIL use drugs for tactical, operational, and strategic reasons that are historically consistent with the behavior of other violent groups in the past. It is worth considering drug consumption within ISIL and other jihadist groups as we consider how to fight them.

Two articles, the first on crimes committed by illegal immigrants in Texas (thanks to John Pizzo for sharing) and the second by NC Listen on the growing world population and its impact on our country. Nancy.

“If illegal aliens can break our laws and get rewarded for it, if illegal aliens have more rights than the taxpayers that pay the billions of dollars to support illegal immigration, then there is no law and we become a de facto lawless nation without borders and without sovereignty.” —Ron Ewart

Very few, if any, Americans know the full scope of crime committed by illegal aliens.

In the State of Texas alone, as reported in the Texas Department of Public Safety:

EXCERPT FROM THIS ARTICLE:

“According to DHS status indicators, over 217,000 criminal aliens have been booked into local Texas jails between June 1, 2011 and March 31, 2017. During their criminal careers, these criminal aliens were charged with more than 579,000 criminal offenses. Those arrests include 1,179 homicide charges; 68,900 assault charges; 16,854 burglary charges; 68,999 drug charges; 699 kidnapping charges; 40,818 theft charges; 45,104 obstructing police charges; 3,813 robbery charges; 6,190 sexual assault charges; and 8,693 weapons charges. Of the total criminal aliens arrested in that timeframe, over 144,000 or 66% were identified by DHS status as being in the US illegally at the time of their last arrest.”

“According to DPS criminal history records, those criminal charges have thus far resulted in over 260,000 convictions including 485 homicide convictions; 25,882 assault convictions; 8,239 burglary convictions; 34,077 drug convictions; 238 kidnapping convictions; 18,543 theft convictions; 22,179 obstructing police convictions; 1,939 robbery convictions; 2,812 sexual assault convictions; and 3,625 weapons convictions. Of the convictions associated with criminal alien arrests, over 173,000 or 66% are associated with aliens who were identified by DHS status as being in the US illegally at the time of their last arrest.”

The curse of criminal illegal aliens

MS-13 gang members rape, murder and destroy lives

by Tammy Bruce March 8, 2017

In November 2016, President-electDonald Trumpsaid this to CBS’ “60 Minutes”: “What we are going to do is get the people that are criminal and have criminal records, gang members, drug dealers, where a lot of these people, probably 2 million, it could be even 3 million, we are getting them out of our country, or we are going to incarcerate.” Everyone, especially liberals and feminists, should be grateful he’s acting on that promise.

The criminal illegal alien population is destroying lives across the country, especially those of young people in immigrant communities.

Under PresidentTrump’s directive to remove criminal illegals from our streets, we are learning about the vast network of one of the world’s most deadly gangs — MS-13. Originally from El Salvador, it found a foothold in Southern California as refugees fleeing the bloody civil war during the 1980s.

Now, as Fox News reports, “With as many as 10,000 members in 46 states, [MS-13] has expanded beyond its initial and local roots and members have been convicted of crimes ranging from kidnapping and murder to drug smuggling and human trafficking.”

Dr. Rosenthal is a child psychiatrist and the founder of the nonprofit substance-abuse treatment and prevention organization Phoenix House.

Jan.10, 2014

Pot is always good for a giggle, and that makes it hard to take marijuana seriously. The news and entertainment media couldn’t resist puns on “Rocky Mountain high” when Colorado started the year with legal sales of marijuana for recreational purposes. TV stations across the country featured chuckling coverage of long lines outside Denver’s new state-licensed pot shops.

Legalizing marijuana isn’t just amusing. It’s increasingly popular with legislators and the public. And why not? No matter how high stoners get, they’re nowhere near as scary as out-of-control boozers, right? Stoners don’t brawl in bars. They’re not into domestic violence.

A Gallup poll last year found 58% of Americans favoring legalization (although other surveys report more slender majorities). Decriminalization of pot possession is widespread: 20 states sanction marijuana use for medical or quasi-medical reasons, and, following Colorado’s and Washington’s lead, proponents of legalization are targeting Alaska and Oregon for ballot initiatives in the near future, and six other states after that.

Yet marijuana is far from safe, despite the widespread effort to make it seem benign. Pot damages the heart and lungs, increases the incidence of anxiety, depression and schizophrenia, and it can trigger acute psychotic episodes. Many adults appear to be able to use marijuana with relatively little harm, but the same cannot be said of adolescents, who are about twice as likely as adults to become addicted to marijuana. The new Colorado law limits pot sales to people 21 or older, but making marijuana available for recreational use normalizes it in society. The drug will be made more easily available to those under 21, and how long until the age limit is dropped to 18?

Adolescents are vulnerable—and not just to pot. That’s how they are programmed. They make rash and risky choices because their brains aren’t fully developed. The part of the brain that censors dumb or dangerous behavior is last to come on line (generally not before the mid-20s). Meanwhile, the brain’s pleasure-seeking structures are up and running strong by puberty. When you link adolescent pleasure-seeking and risk-taking to marijuana’s impairment of perception and judgment, it isn’t surprising that a 2004 study of seriously injured drivers in Maryland found half the teens tested positive for pot.

Marijuana impairs learning, judgment and memory—no small matters during the adolescent years—and it can do lasting harm to the brain. Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, has found that marijuana can damage cognitive function in adolescents by disrupting the normal development of the white-matter that brain cells need to communicate with each other.

Most disturbing is a discovery about marijuana last month at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. Researchers there have found lasting changes in “working memory,” brain structures critical to memory and reasoning. A source of ready recall for basic information, like telephone numbers, and solutions to everyday problems, working memory is also a strong predictor of academic achievement. (more…)

The Washington Times

Foreign-policy flaws leave national security in shambles

By J.D. Gordon- J.D. Gordon was the vice president for communications and a foreign policy and national security adviser to Herman Cain’s 2012 Republican presidential nomination campaign

Friday, December 30, 2011

So 2011 has come and gone – yet another bleak chapter in our national security outlook under President Obama. Considering that we have a president who made it a point to apologize for our superpower status, the notion that he would somehow weaken the country should not be surprising. After all, he’s only matching his words with deeds.

The Obama administration naturally would dispute this assertion, citing the “elimination” of al Qaeda icons Osama bin Laden via SEAL Team 6 in Pakistan and U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki via drone strike in Yemen. True, both moves were bold, and the president deserves credit for making those tough decisions. However, in the grand scheme of things, targeted killings of terrorist leaders are more a series of one-offs than a comprehensive strategy to strengthen our national security.

Contrary to the narrative carefully woven by the current administration, the list is long in ways that Mr. Obama has weakened America this year. Let’s look at five specific reasons:

Incoherent strategy for the Arab Spring: The helter-skelter approach of supporting whichever protest movements he thought would win has led to the ouster of friendly governments in Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen while we ignore a long-term adversary in Syria. Hard-line Islamists are prevailing at the ballot box – meaning hostile anti-U.S., anti-Israel regimes likely will be the new normal. And while Libya’s Col. Moammar Gadhafi was summarily executed by a mob – made possible through more than a billion U.S. taxpayer dollars spent to crush his military, there’s no telling if the new government will be able to provide long-term stability without massive Western aid. (more…)